


The Old and the New

by TheExplorer



Series: Sean and the Doctor [1]
Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen, Major Original Character(s), Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-25
Packaged: 2018-01-11 22:31:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1178741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheExplorer/pseuds/TheExplorer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sean Matherson was studying for his Master's degree in Astrophysics until he started traveling with the Doctor eight months ago. Now he is faced an old and familiar enemy of the Doctor's, with an outcome that no one, not even Sean, expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"Next stop, Tokyo!" The Doctor shouted as he pulled down several levers on the TARDIS console.

"Woohoo!" yelled Sean Matherson, giddy with the expectation of another adventure. Far beyond the days when he timidly clung to the railings while the TARDIS moved, he now held on and shouted with delight as the room rocked and jolted.

Finally, after several minutes of flight, the TARDIS landed. The Doctor ran down the walkway, throwing open the door to look at the outside world.

"Welcome! To- Oh." He quickly stopped and spun around, shutting the doors and putting his back to them, his face pale. "That- is absolutely, most definitely, _not_ Tokyo."

"What? Oh, not again..." Sean said, recalling his first adventure with the Doctor, where what was supposed to be a trip to his apartment turned into the exploration and accidental destruction of a Silurian base on Galamar 3.

The Doctor peeked out of the TARDIS again. What he saw was an intersection of steel-lined underground tunnels that looked distinctly Silurian in origin. He quickly returned to the TARDIS and shut the doors, keeping his back to Sean.

"What- Is it? What's out there?" asked Sean.

The Doctor turned around and walked back up the ramp, his face much more serious than it often was. "You- are staying here." He ordered, pointing at Sean.

 

"But, what is it? Can't you at least _tell_ me?" responded Sean, annoyed. There were few times when he had seen the Doctor act like this. He had never forced Sean to stay behind before. Any other time he had welcomed Sean to come along with him. Many of their impromptu arrivals had led to the greatest adventures that Sean had experienced while traveling with the Doctor.

"It's... Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I am going to investigate- nothing. Just nothing. I'll just do it- alone." He said, trying to reassure himself just as much as he was trying to keep the reality from Sean.  He was afraid because he knew, deep down, that whatever was out there really was the one thing that he most dreaded. But, it couldn't be.  That was gone. Fixed. Twice! It _couldn'_ _t_ come back. The Universe wasn't that mad, was it?

"No, it's not _nothing_. It's never _nothing_  with you. Since you won't tell me, then I have to assume that it's something _really_ bad. Something that you know will only bring with it great danger. Danger apparently so great that you can't even be bothered to tell me what it is!" Sean said, returning the Doctor's stern gaze and proving once again that he was much more than some little tag-along that the Doctor had "picked up" one day in the library.

"Alright!" the Doctor shouted. "I don=t _know_ what it is! And I absolutely _hate_ not knowing things! Because, well- the one thing that my every instinct is telling me is there is... is impossible!" Never had he been at such a loss for words. He actually wanted to just not know what was. Because not knowing was in the case quite a bit better than the likely truth.

"Fine!" Sean shouted back. "You just- Go out there and be your stubborn old self! I'll just be right here when you manage to get it through your stupid thick skull that you don't have to do everything alone!"

The Doctor stood on the ramp looking back at Sean. "I'm sorry," he said finally. "But this is how it has to be. Just this once." He turned and walked to the door, taking out his screwdriver in anticipation of whatever it was that was out there.

 

The Doctor cautiously stepped out of the TARDIS. In a flash, he jumped towards the wall of the tunnel as the center of the floor below him lit up and began to hum and move.

"Weight-sensitive magnetic transport path.  Thanks, but I think I'll stick to exploring on my own rather than being shuttled around to who-knows-where with my feet stuck to the floor." He continued to inch down the tunnel, his screwdriver held protectively in front of him in his hand. There was another humming noise now, and it was growing louder as he went on through the tunnel. He could see a light up ahead coming from around a bend in the tunnel. Carefully he crept to the corner of the hallway and peeked around the corner.

What he saw caused him to jump out into the middle of the tunnel, pointing his screwdriver at the all-too-familiar man standing at a large, distinctly Silurian-looking control panel in the middle of the room.

The man standing at the console...

...was the Master.


	2. Chapter 2

"HOW ARE YOU ALIVE?!" shouted the Doctor, completely baffled.

"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?!" shouted the Master, annoyed.

"WHO DO YOU THINK?!" shouted the Doctor back, brandishing his screwdriver. "NEW FACE!"

"Oh, oh, oh..." said the Master, rolling his eyes and shaking his head with that wry, maniacal smile. AThe little Doctor has come back to spoil all of my fun again. To be honest, I'm not sure how you found me. I hid myself quite well.  The last time you saw me, I was killed when I burned up my life force. In case you hadn't noticed, I'm not dead anymore. I'm sick of you managing to pop in every single time I want to try and do something."

 

"I came back, but I'm not about to tell you how. And you would think," he added, tapping his finger on his head, "that the drumming would be gone now, right? Well, IT'S NOT! IT'S STILL HERE, JUST LIKE ALWAYS!" With that, he reached down to the control panel and pulled down a lever.

"AH!!" The Doctor cried out, sinking to his knees as an immense amount of electricity coursed through him through the floor. He could see the arcs popping and jumping all over his body. Then he noticed where they were the strongest: the hand that held his sonic screwdriver.

"I suggest you drop it if you want the pain to stop. It only hurts if you're touching something metallic" said the Master, grinning maniacally.

"No." said the Doctor, clenching his teeth from the pain. He tried to adjust his grip to hold his screwdriver by its leather grip, but that had no effect.

"Well, I guess I'll just have to give you a little extra _incentive_." The Doctor looked over to the far wall of the room, where a large glass containment chamber stood. It was flooded with fog, and several tubes and cords could be seen coming out of it. The fog began to clear slightly, and the Doctor recognized the young man strapped inside.

"SEAN!!" The Doctor cried out, then doubled over from the pain of the electricity.

"Don't bother; he can't hear you. It seems that he just couldn't resist going in after you. Too bad he neglected my little booby trap transport system. _Pathetic_.  They're just little puppies, following you around. Now, this one is about to be my first test subject."

" _Leave him alone_ ," said the Doctor through gritted teeth. He was incredibly close to giving in to the pain.

 

"Oh Doctor, you know as well as I do that that's not going to happen. Besides, you don't even know what I'm going to do with him. Not that I mind telling you, since you're clearly incapacitated right now. Look around you, Doctor. The Silurians did love to experiment, which makes it quite a bit easier to do what I want to do. Too bad they abandoned this facility decades ago."

"What- are going to do?@ asked the Doctor, still doubled over in pain.

"Look around you, Doctor! I'm going to bring back the Time Lords." He smiled again, his insanity plain on every corner of his face. "They might be physically gone, but I can still steal ideas and minds. I found a way to retrieve minds from the Time Vortex that we thought had been lost. All I need are human vessels for them, and I can bring back an army of Time Lords. I will be the first thing that they see, and they will have to bow down to me as the rightful king of a resurrected race! Of course, if they won't bow down to me, then I'll just have to kill them. And I'll make sure their new bodies can't regenerate."

"You don't have to do this! It will never work! They're _gone_. You can't reawaken a dead race like this. You have to face the facts!"

"Too late! And if it doesn't work, then your friend dies anyway! Oh well!" With that, the Master pulled down another lever, setting into motion a series of other processes. They heard a clunking sound from inside the chamber, and then it began to flood with a golden light.

"AAAH!!" the Doctor cried out, finally letting his screwdriver drop to the floor, where it was instantly held in place by the magnetized floor. The electricity instantly stopped flowing through him. He ran over to the Master, pushing him into a choke hold against the control panel.

"STOP IT! NOW!" he yelled, his face showing the full fury of a 1200-year-old Time Lord.

"It's too late now!" sputtered out the Master.

"THERE HAS TO BE A WAY!" the Doctor yelled, throwing the Master against the wall.

 

"Well, there isn't! You'll just make everything worse if you try to mess with it now."The Master stood rubbing his neck as the Doctor frantically looked over the control panel, trying to learn the workings of it and figure out a way to stop or undo the process. He refused to believe that he was helpless to stop his friend from being taken over by another mind, leaving the Sean he once knew lost forever.

Suddenly, the glass of the chamber began to crack, right in the places where the shafts of golden light were beaming through. Quickly, the cracks spread, before finally the pressure inside caused the glass to shatter. Then, out of the fog, the figure that had been Sean walked forward, after bending down for a brief second as if to retrieve an item that he had dropped. He walked forward in an almost trance-like gait, like some powerful being awakening from a long slumber. They could now see that the golden light was streaming out of his face, turning the fog billowing from the now broken chamber into golden clouds enveloping the room.

When he was only a few feet from the Master, the fog and light around his face cleared, and he spoke.

"Good Gallifrey, you are _thick_." Then Sean swung a hard right punch right straight into the Master's face.

"W-What?!" The Master stared at Sean in complete and utter disbelief. "I- I'm your king! I brought you back, saved you from being lost forever in the Time War!"

"Again, you are thicker than thick. You didn't _retrieve_ me, because I never _went_ anywhere." Then, he turned to the Doctor, after straightening the collar on his black jacket, the silver buttons on the epaulets seeming to gleam from the effect of the fog. "Doctor, the entire time I've been traveling with you," he said, pulling a fob watch out of his pocket, "I've been right here."


	3. Chapter 3

The Doctor stared at Sean, his mind racing, trying to see how in the universe he could have missed something this big. His own companion, a Time Lord! A member of his own lost race, right in front of him the entire time!

"I am so stupid! Stupid, stupid Doctor!" he smacked his hand to his face, causing Sean to smirk and sputter out a bit of laughter. "How could I possibly have missed that?!" he exclaimed, gesturing at Sean with his hand. 

The Doctor had suspected since the day he had met Sean in that library in Cambridge that there was just a little something different about him, but he had never been able to quite figure out what it was. It was something slightly familiar, but the Doctor just assumed that it was because the young man's mannerisms reminded him of himself, enthusiastic and adventurous as Sean was.

"I guess you could say I'm good at hiding. And by the way," Sean said, swelling with pride, "My name is Kasteron." He flipped up the collar on his jacket, dusting off his shoulders. The black restraint straps from the holding chamber still dangled off of his wrists, the rivets on the ends of them pulled out from the walls of the chamber, showing just how strong he really was. Then he turned to the Master, grabbing hold of him by the jacket and swiftly using the straps to tie the Master=s hands behind his back.

 

  "Don't think I forgot about you. You probably thought you'd won, when in fact you're the whole reason that I am who I am right now. So thanks," he added with a condescending smirk, the Master glaring at him in return with bared teeth. He swung the Master around, giving the job of restraining him to the Doctor. The Doctor could see that the person in front of him was not Sean Matherson anymore. This was the Time Lord named Kasteron, although the Doctor little knew little about him yet, besides the fact that he was definitely a friend.

"Ah, so that's it..." The young Time Lord looked at the control panel for a minute then tossed the Doctor a small cartridge of some gaseous mixture. "Just make him breathe that in and he'll go unconscious. It's the same sedative he used on me when he strapped me into that chamber. Then it's up to you what to do with him. I have to disarm this system so that no one can ever try to use it again, not that it worked in the first place." He looked back down at the panel, absorbed in his work as his mind was swiftly figuring out how to undo and lock every single mechanism that the Master had set. He had decided that he would rather dismantle the equipment than blow up the entire complex.

The Doctor looked down at the Master as he held him in his arms, just like he had on that fateful day when the Master's own wife had killed him. Now he would finally be able to fulfill what he had tried to do then, and imprison the Master so that he could do no more harm. He knew the Master would resist taking the sedative, but he also knew how to make him open his mouth, because the Master _loved_ to talk.

"So now I'm just going to be your little pet, Doctor? You think you can just lock me up and forget about me? I suppose you think it's somehow better than killing me, even though we both that's the only solution that can really work for me. But you don't want to have the blood of anyone else on your hands." The Master spoke with menace in every single syllable that he uttered. The Doctor was his greatest enemy, but he had realized that he had lost. He opened his mouth wide, daring the Doctor to spray the sedative and knock him out.

Of course, that was exactly what the Doctor did, causing the Master's body to quickly go limp in his arms. He said nothing, because he knew the Master was right. Still, he did really believe that what he was going to do was the best plan. He had already caused the deaths of enough people in his travels, and he didn't want to let it happen again, no matter the character of the man he would spare.  The safest place was to be locked away, deep inside his TARDIS.

 

"Done," said Kasteron, spinning around to the Doctor as he pressed a last button on the panel. The entire panel went dark, the screens blipping out to nothing. Just to be sure, he reached down below the panel and yanked out a random group of wires, causing them to spark and then die. "Well, that's set," he said, throwing the wires aside. "Let's go."

Kasteron helped the Doctor carry the body of the Master as they walked back the TARDIS. The dismantling of the control panel had disabled the transport paths, enabling them to walk down the middle of the tunnels without worry. Together they carried him into the TARDIS and through its corridors, he Doctor leading the way. It was several long minutes before they arrived at their destination, but Kasteron could tell by the Doctor's demeanor that he wasn't exactly in the mood to chat. While Kasteron had only just met the Master, for the Doctor he was a lifelong enemy, with an incredible amount of history between the two men.

Finally they arrived, and the Doctor dropped the Master's limp body down. The door glowed slightly as the Doctor pressed his hand into a circular depression on the surface. Symbols appeared, and he traced his finger along several paths, apparently tracing out some sort of lock combination. The door opened into a room with a large stasis chamber inside, somewhat like the one Kasteron had been held in by the Master.

It was only somewhat like that chamber because this chamber was made specifically for a Time Lord. In the time before the fall of Gallifrey the Doctor had created this chamber for his great enemy, knowing that he needed a way to stop the Master without killing him. But he had never gotten to use it. He had found the Master again at the end of the Universe in human form, before he regenerated and stole the Doctor's TARDIS, using it to travel back to Earth and carry out his plan to devastate the human race. He had lost, though, with an entire year being essentially deleted before he was shot by his human wife and refused to regenerate.

 

But now was his chance. With Kasteron's help, he strapped the Master into the straps in the chamber, just as the shot of sedative was wearing off.

"You're a coward. You always will be. You've caused the deaths of so many, but you can't do it when it comes to your greatest enemy," the Master said groggily, his voice still seething with hatred for the Doctor and everything that he stood for.

"I'm not a coward. You are. An old friend of mine once said: 'True courage is not about knowing when to take a life, but when to spare one'. Brilliant man, traveled with me for a while. He had the greatest imagination, and a real knack for languages. You'd be amazed about some of his inspirations. Now, you are going to stay here. You can't cause any more trouble, and this is the most secure place in the universe. So this is goodbye, my old adversary. Look who gets the last laugh now."

Before the Master had a chance to answer, the Doctor had finished strapping him in and closed the chamber, injecting the strong sedatives as Kasteron watched the man in the chamber seem to go peacefully to sleep, even though the mind within was far from peaceful.

This was the darkest that Kasteron had ever seen the Doctor, and the most that he had ever connected with his past. Kasteron wondered why the Doctor had never told him of his past, but that was something he could ask later. Now it was his turn to tell the story.

Once they had engaged the full stasis sequence and locked the chamber again, the Doctor turned to Kasteron, his face brighter again.

"So, Sean, Kasteron, whatever your name is now... Who exactly are you?"


	4. Chapter 4

"So, I suppose I'll start from the beginning," Sean said as they walked through the TARDIS corridors back to the central console room. "Counting my time as a human, I am 112 now. I was 100 when I had to leave Gallifrey. My father was a Time Agent, while my mother was a scientist, so you could say that my genius came naturally. I know you're supposed to be at least 100 before you finish the first round of school, but I was only 90 when I had finished and memorized everything they had to teach me.

"I was nearly done with my studies when things started to take a turn for the worse. Everywhere there was talk of armies gathering, and that really terrible things were coming. The night that everything happened, my dad was on leave again for a mission. He was often gone, but the times he was home were my favorite. He would take me everywhere to explore the city, and sometimes he would even take me to other worlds when my mum wasn't looking. I loved every second of it. I really dreamed big dreams as a kid.

"But in the times when my dad was gone and my mum was busy, I heard the stories of you, Doctor. I heard of how you traveled around the universe, saving planets, saving lives. Course, to everyone else you were the _renegade_ , exactly the one kids _weren'_ _t_ supposed to want to aspire to. But that's what made me idolize you even more. You didn't let the High Council or the Lord President or anyone else rule you, you were your own boss. In times of trouble, you always seemed to find your own way out of it, doing what you knew was best. And I loved that.

"I was always making things. I even made my own version of your sonic screwdriver. Except that mine was different. Mine," he paused, smiling mischievously, "was _better_."

The Doctor scoffed at him, dubious. "Better? How can something home-made possibly be _better_ than my sonic?"

 

But Sean simply smirked back.

"It does wood... and just about everything else you can think of. Literally. I added a keypad to type in the specific frequencies. Although... I don't exactly have it with me right now. It's sitting in a chest of my things from Gallifrey, buried in the woods near where I lived as a human. Oh ya!" He exclaimed as an afterthought, remembering the story he had to get back to telling.

"Bit scatterbrained, eh?" the Doctor teased. The comment then was met by a glare from Sean.

"Anyway," he began again with a sigh, "I was nearly done with school when things turned bad. My dad was out, and I was in my room working out more modifications on my screwdriver. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary to me, but my mum seemed worried about something, like she knew that something was about to happen. All of the sudden, I heard shouts down the road, so I looked out my window to see what it was. I-I didn't really understand what was happening. It looked like soldiers were coming around to the houses, and forcing people to come with them. People my age. There was shouting in the streets, and soldiers storming into homes.

"I could guess now what was going on. I gathered up my screwdriver and tools and stuffed them into a chest as fast as I could. Stuffing it into my bag, I ran downstairs to find my mum, holding my dad's old vortex manipulator and a chameleon arch." He paused, sadness filling his eyes. "I- I told her that I couldn't take it. I didn't want what I knew was going to happen. 'Please, Kasteron, you'll be okay. I promise,' she said to me, choking up with tears. Because she wasn't about to let anyone take me away. We all knew that they were gathering people for an army, taking the youngest and fittest first. They would've made me be some strategist or general. They would've made me fight, and I really didn't want to do that. So I listened to her. We ran out the back door, to the fields behind the house. We'd made a plan when talk of conflict had begun that if anything ever happened I would use the vortex manipulator to flee. My parents wanted to ensure my safety over their own. They didn't want me to see war or those sorts of things if I didn't have to, because they knew how it could change a person.

 

AWhen I was out the back, there were knocks on the door, and I knew that was it. I hugged her tightly, refusing to let go, knowing that if I did, I might never see her again. This was supposed to be our quick escape, but something told me it wasn't going to be quick.

"'Those doors won't last long, and when you hear them even begin to break, you run. Use what your father taught you, and run. Run far away from here. You've always wanted to see the universe on your own. Here's your chance.' As she spoke the last words, a slight smile crept onto her tear-stained face, and even on mine as well. I told that I didn't want to leave her. But that was it. We heard the gruff voices at our door. When no answer came, they blasted through.

"'Kasteron, I love you. Don't ever forget that,' she told me.' 'Now RUN!!' I could see the strength, but also the fear, in her eyes. I ran as fast as I could into the field. When I was a ways out, I opened up my vortex manipulator and paused. Where would I go? Where was safe? And that's where I thought of Earth. You seemed to frequent there so often, I figured that if I landed there that I would have at least a chance of you finding me. Then I could go back to Gallifrey once it was over, and in the meantime I could travel with you. It was a kid's dream, really. I had a few seconds after I punched in the coordinates to look back at my home. The sky was its usual orange, and the weather of the day seemed so, so opposite in feeling to what was happening. The last thing I saw were the soldiers threatening her with their weapons, asking her where I was, but she refused to move. Just as one of the soldiers spotted me out in the field, I saw them hit her aside, knocking her down. 'MUM!!' I screamed, trying to run towards her- but it was too late.

 

"When my foot next hit the ground, I was no longer on Gallifrey. I was on Earth, and my mother was endless miles away now. I fell down in grassy field, my head aching from the effects of time travel without a capsule. I looked down at what I could for the moment use simply as a watch, and saw that it was 2001. I walked through the field towards a group of houses. Coming close to one of them, I could see that I looked about 12 in human years. Maybe, I thought to myself, I could use that. A kid wandering around alone on Earth just simply wouldn't work, and I knew so little of Earth life that I would stick out like a sore thumb. So I decided then that I would somehow get myself adopted.

"It was stupid luck that I came upon that house. It was evening, and a couple were sitting down to dinner. I could see no child or pictures as evidence of one, and so I walked up and rang the doorbell. The woman answered. She was in her late 30s, with long wavy dark brown hair and a face that reminded me strikingly of my mother, even though I knew it wasn't her. Realizing suddenly that I hadn't fully planned things out, I stared for a moment, before saying that I was lost and didn't know what to do. Then everything went black.

"I woke up in a soft bed in the house. I hadn't ever traveled in time like that on my own before, and my poor landing on top of the stress of the events past had caused me to pass out. I sat up to see the woman walk into the room. 'Henry! Henry, he's awake!' she said, causing the man named Henry to come running into the room. 'Oh, thank goodness. Now, boy,' he said with a London accent, 'who are you?'

"'Well, that is a bit complicated. I might begin by telling you where I'm from. I know this might be a bit more than you can handle at the moment, but my name is Kasteron. I am a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey, and recent troubles at my home have landed me here, on Earth. You have to trust me on this, even if there isn't any really good way of convincing you that I am, in fact, telling the truth,' I said to them, speaking in English. It took me a bit to think as they just stood there in the room, looking at me with shocked eyes. But then I realized what I could use- my screwdriver.

 

"'My bag- where is it? It has something inside that I need.' The man called Henry picked the bag up and held it. Before he gave me the bag, he spoke: 'Er- Kasteron, if that is what your name is, I don't honestly know what to believe right now. A boy has just collapsed on my doorstep and woken up in my house, claiming he's some sort of refugee from another planet.' I winced a bit at that word, _refugee_. Essentially, that was what I was. Fleeing a war, trying to find somewhere to hide while it all boils over. While my thoughts raced, Henry continued: 'I don't think anyone could make that story up. It's really a bit odd, but there is just _something_ about you that makes me really want to believe what you say. You may be loony, but you're genuine. Anna, do you agree?' The woman called Anna, whom I would soon believe was the only mother I ever had, breathed a heavy sigh and nodded. She took the bag from Henry, who I would soon call my father, and handed it to me. I quickly rummaged through it, grabbing out my screwdriver. I knew exactly what I would do with it.

"I held it vertically, typing several things into the keypad until I had what I wanted. With a click, a projection opened up: a hologram of Gallifrey. I had compiled it based upon every map and picture I could find back home, so that I would have the most accurate map in the whole universe to use when I went exploring. As the three-dimensional and, I have to say _incredibly_ detailed hologram projected, my soon-to-be-called-mom-and-dad just gazed at it with awe. 'This... this is amazing,' said Anna, a tear coming to her eye.

"But I knew that I had to cut to the chase. I couldn't stay here as who I was, because I would stick out too much, knowing very little about Earth culture. I turned the projection off, and reached into my bag for something else, something I was so, so scared to use- a chameleon arch. My parents had taught me how to use it if I ever had to, and had given me a fob watch along with it, with my name inscribed on the casing. 'Now, this is the hard part. I have to use this device, and well, you are to me the best people to do this.'

"They looked at me blankly, not knowing a thing of what I was talking about. 'This device will turn me human. It is the only way for me to live in this world, because I know hardly anything about life here. Thing is, I need someone to take care of me, someone to teach me the ways of this world, and to help me live here. I need someone to be my caretakers.' Just as I finished, Henry spoke again: 'You want us to be your parents.' I nodded. 'Will you?' I asked, fully expecting to be turned down. No one wanted to adopt a kid from another planet who popped up on their doorstep one night. At least, that's what I thought.

 

"'Yes,= said Anna, placing her hand upon mine. 'We will take care of you, because we have no children of our own. You may seem larger than life and unreal to me now, but I will treat as my true son.'

"That was the best I could've hoped for. The deal was set, and so together we created the person you knew as Sean Matherson. They had only just moved to the area, and so explaining the sudden appearance of a new son wasn't so difficult. I let them decide my name, and spent much of the night writing out my journal in English so that they could read it and see exactly what sort of a person I was. I explained to them that they would have to constantly remind me who I was at first, that I would probably have dreams of other worlds that they would have to simply dismiss as a vivid imagination. Above all, I told them that I could never, ever lose that fob watch. That watch would be me, the real me, and if it was gone, I might never be able to come back. After hacking into a couple databases to create fake birth and school records, it was ready. All I had to do was...use it.

"The three of us sat in the living room as I held it in my hands. I placed the fob watch in the arch, and put it on my head. I was about to flip the switch to initiate the changing sequence when I broke into tears. My whole identity would be rewritten, with the real me trapped inside a watch for who knows how long. I didn=t want to feel weak. I hated feeling weak, but I felt helpless, helpless that the only thing I could do was run and hide while I had no idea what was happening to my real home. My new parents held me between them as I wept. They understood what was about to happen, at least somewhat. I didn't think that I could do it, but at the same time, I knew it had to. Henry asked if he wanted me to do it for him, but I simply shook my head. This was my decision, and I had to make it myself."

Finally, Kasteron stopped for a moment. They were in the central console room now. He sat down in one of the chairs, tired from the emotions brought back by telling his tale.

"Its been twelve years. Twelve years since all of that happened, twelve years since I last saw my mother, or my father, or anything else on Gallifrey." His eyes watered as he held back tears.

 

"But now, I found you, Doctor!" He looked up at the elder Time Lord, his eyes full of hope. "Now we can go back, back to Gallifrey, back home, back to my family! It's been this long now, any war that might have come about should be over now, right?"

The Doctor turned away from him. He was so full of hope, and he had waited so, so long. How could he possibly tell him that there was nowhere left to go back to? That it was _his_ fault that the world they both once adored was now gone forever, and that everyone they knew was gone with it? The answer was that he couldn't. At least, not yet.

"Ya!" He turned around, trying to make his smile look as genuine as possible, and hoping that Kasteron wouldn't notice. "But," he said, putting his hand on the younger Time Lord's shoulder, "don't you want to get your things first? I want solid proof that your sonic is 'better' than mine."

Kasteron smiled. "Alright. I'll dial in the coordinates, and then you do the rest!"

The Doctor motioned with his hand towards the console. "Don't you want to give it a go yourself?"

"I, er- sort of left Gallifrey before I actually learned how to pilot a TARDIS," he said sheepishly.

"You never learned how to pilot a TARDIS?" the Doctor said, smirking and trying not to laugh. Piloting a TARDIS was one of the most basic things a Time Lord learned to do.

Kasteron glowered at him and shot him a quick punch in the arm. "Shuttup. My dad always used a vortex manipulator. It was his philosophy that they're smaller and simpler to use than a TARDIS, making them perfect for quick jumps. So pfffffbbbbttt," he added, sticking his tongue out childishly.

"Oi! That was unnecessary!" The Doctor stood rubbing his sore arm. For a kid, he could pack a lot of power behind his punches. "Anyway, just input the coordinates here-" he pointed to a screen on the console "-and I'll do the rest."

 

Kasteron did just that, and the Doctor followed up by sending the TARDIS rocking into motion. After several seconds the room stopped moving, indicating that the time machine had landed.

"I'll go first, seeing as I know the way," said Kasteron as he walked down the ramp to the door. They had landed in a field on the outskirts of a little town, the same place where he had found himself twelve years ago, alone and scared. At least, it had been twelve years for him. For the place they were in now, it had only been a few months, thanks to some surprisingly accurate timing by the TARDIS. He led the Doctor into the woods on the edge of the field, then began looking carefully at the base of every tree trunk he passed.

"Here it is!" said Kasteron, bending down to dig at the underside of an exposed root at the base of an old oak tree. After pulling aside several layers of carefully placed moss, he hit a hard chest, pulling it out the rest of the way with the Doctor's help. It was in nearly the same condition as he when he put it there, with inscriptions carved all over it in circular Gallifreyan. To open it, he pressed his hand into the center, tracing one of the inscriptions with the pressure of his finger. As the chest clicked open, Kasteron turned to the Doctor, smiling like a little boy showing his favorite toys to his best friend for the first time.

Inside were some of his old clothes, packed away for safe keeping, and to hide his real identity while he lived as a human.

"I grew a bit, huh?" Kasteron said, holding up the rust-colored tunic that was about 12 sizes too small for him now. Its collar was embroidered in emerald-colored thread with yet more circular Gallifreyan.

Setting it into the lid of the chest so as not to dirty it on the ground, he reached in to pull out the rest of his treasures. First came the chameleon arch, which he quickly put aside, eager to forget the painful memories that surrounded it. Then came the vortex manipulator that he had used to get there, which he then strapped on his wrist. Who knew? It could come in handy some day.

 

"Hang on, who did you say you got this from again?" said the Doctor, holding Kasteron's wrist and examining the engravings on the device's wrist strap. AThis is the mark of the Corsair!@

"Ya! This was my dad's spare, but it originally belonged to my grandad- or grandmum, depending on which regeneration you were going by." He smiled proudly after stating the matter-of-fact family history which suddenly gave the Doctor a pang in his hearts. It was just yet another reminder that everything was really gone, and that he had been able to do nothing at all to help his friend the Corsair.

Kasteron reached back into the chest, and pulled out his prized possession. It was similar to the Doctor's screwdriver, but with a keypad towards the bottom of the barrel, with a cover on it that doubled as a screen. "I call it the SonicJack," he said, holding it up as the blue-green tip and coppery casing glinted in the afternoon sunlight. AIt has programmed settings I can access by simply inputting their code word into the key pad. I designed it myself, based after yours."

The Doctor had to admit he was impressed, especially if he had in fact made it himself. He looked down at his own screwdriver, which the TARDIS had made for him after his last one was damaged.

"Alright, prove it. Prove it works."

"Easy." Kasteron gave the Doctor a challenging look, then quickly typed in a code, his fingers flying across the tiny keys. After he found what he wanted, he pointed it at the Doctor's sonic, smiling his now characteristic and mischievous smile. With a buzzing sound and a glow from the SonicJack's tip, the elder Time Lord's screwdriver began to float in midair.

"OI!" he yelled, grabbing his precious tool back before it could be levitated any higher. "DON'T TOUCH THE SONIC!" With a whip of his hand, he sent Kasteron's device flying out of his hand and down to the ground, several meters away.

"Hey! Not fair!"

 

"Oh, _I'_ _m_ not fair?!" The Doctor said as Kasteron retrieved his tool.

"You wanted to see proof that it works! There it is! Yours can't levitate things, mine can! It's not _my_ fault that the best object to use that function on happens to be one that you're so picky about."

"Rule Number One!! NO TOUCHING MY SONIC!"

"Technically, I didn't actually _touch_ it."

"I don=t care! You leave it alone!" The Doctor kissed the green emitter, earning an odd look from his companion.

They packed the tunic and chameleon arch back into the chest, leaving the moss uncovered as they headed back to the TARDIS. The altercation had been a fun and light-hearted distraction for the Doctor, but he still knew what he had to do. Whatever happened, this kid may end up being a lot more than he bargained for.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Back in the TARDIS, Kasteron took the chest to his room, while the Doctor stayed in the console room, thinking over what he absolutely did not want to say to such a bright young Time Lord. Before this, he had never met someone whose energy and cheekiness quite matched his own, but this was it. He was young, and had so much potential.    

"So, now we go home, right? I've got everything, and hopefully my dad will even be home, too. You will love meeting them, Doctor. Of course, they'll be just as pleased to meet you, Doctor. Doctor?" His smiled turned into a quizzical expression when the Doctor refused to face him.

"Kasteron, there=s something I need to tell you."

"Hmm? Ya, what? Is the war not over yet?" his expression fell slightly, but he rebounded right back. "Cuz if we need to, ya know, travel around for a while until it's safe, that's fine too!"

 

"Oh, it's over. It's just that the... _outcome_ wasn't exactly so great."

"What do you mean? Doctor, nothing could ever defeat Gallifrey. We watch over the Universe. Not even the Daleks stand a chance against us."

"That's just it," he said, his voice quivering slightly, trying to hold back the guilt and sorrow and anger. "No one stood a chance against anyone else in that war. Kasteron, we lost. Everyone lost."

Kasteron was panicking, and his emotions were yet again getting the better of him. Still, he stood in disbelief. No one could defeat the Time Lords. It simply wasn't possible. Right?

"I'm sorry. I really am so, so sorry, Kasteron. There- there was no other choice. That war waged for along time, and in the end, it was..." his voice broke as he cried, "it was lose Gallifrey, or lose the whole of creation. I didn't have any other choice."                                   

"No... You're lying. You're talking like this is _your_ fault. That isn't possible. You're the Doctor. You help people, you save lives, you save _worlds_. How could you destroy your own?"

"I didn't have any other choice," he said through gritted teeth. The entirety of his guilt over the Time War was standing in front of him, personified into a young genius who now could never, ever see the family he had waited for so long to come back to. He tried to reach out to him, tried to console him, but he only backed away.

"No," said Kasteron, his voice strained through tears. He was shaking. He couldn't believe this. Everything was supposed to work out. He was supposed to come home and see his family again, then he could finish his schooling. This was never part of his plan. "Get away from me. You're not a Doctor, you're a monster."

"Kasteron, please, I can help. I know what you're feeling. You think I didn't feel the same way? I really, truly had. No. Other. Choice."

 

Kasteron pulled back his sleeve, opening the flap that exposed the controls for his vortex manipulator. "There is _always_ a choice."

"KASTERON, NO!!" the Doctor yelled, grabbing for him, but it was too late. His arms grabbed at air, and the one person he wanted so badly to help, whose sorrow was completely his fault, was gone. 


	5. Chapter 5

_He was alone. Again. Looking around, he saw that he was in an alleyway. It seemed foreign to him, and old, yet somehow ever so slightly familiar. The vortex manipulator'_ _s dials told him he was in London, 1830. Falling back against the wall, he slid down into a crouch, his head in his hands. Around him was a bustling city, but he was so absorbed in his thoughts that nothing of the outside world really seemed to matter. Nothing mattered at all anymore, because everything he longed for was gone._

_And it was all his fault. He knew the Doctor was right, but he couldn'_ _t bear the truth. Just like before, he had run. He had run away from the truth, from the things he didn'_ _t want to happen but that he knew had to. He should have stayed with his mother that day, instead of running out into the field. Why had he listened? He could have stayed behind with her. He could have at least taken her with him before it was too late._

"I could have, but I didn't," he said to himself. _Maybe he could have even prevented the war if he had stayed behind, or at least tried. If he hadn'_ _t idolized that mad Doctor, he might have at least been more hesitant to run. Now, he could see how that man was no idol, or hero, or anything of the things he had thought of him as before. How could you possibly see destroying your own world as an option? In his mind, there had to be another option._

_  
_

_But whatever the Doctor had done was far out of his control. The Doctor had stayed through the war, and fought for Gallifrey. He, Kasteron, had run away before it got scary, just like a child. Clearly, that hadn'_ _t changed. Now, for the second time in his life, he was lost and alone, having given up the only guidance and help that he had. And he felt like an idiot for it._

 

"NO!!" The Doctor yelled, as Kasteron's arm disappeared before his hand could touch it. He threw up his arms in anger. Now he knew the truth, and whose fault it was that his hopes were gone forever. There had to still be a way to help him. Honestly, he had thought that his TARDIS was impossible to transport out of. But then, that wasn't an ordinary vortex manipulator. It couldn't have been, not if it had belonged to the Corsair.

Then it struck him. He ran to the console, his fingers flying across keys and switching screens until he found the log of locations. If he could just use it to...

"YES!" He spun around in a circle, coming back to pull down the lever to rock the time machine into motion. Kasteron's jump had left a trail, and he could follow that trail to find him. He straddled the console, grasping the steering devices like they were joysticks. He refused to lose him again.

 

_At least he had options... Even if one of those options involved going back to Cambridge and living as a human, oblivious to any pain or loss that the real him had experienced. But could he really do that again? Now that he was free again, could he really go back to being trapped, possibly never to return? No. He had lost so much, but he couldn'_ _t lose his only sense of self again._

_Looking down at his wrist, another thought came to mind. Maybe he could travel the Universe like had always wanted to, just without the Doctor. Ya, he could do that. He wasn’t a child anymore, he could handle himself. It wouldn'_ _t be easy, but it was possible. And, hey, it would be pretty fun, right?_

Getting up, he composed himself. He wouldn’t let this rule his life; he had to take charge.

_  
_

But someone else wanted to take charge, too. Or at least, to help. A sudden wind picked up only a few feet away from Kasteron, and he knew exactly what that meant. He could have run again, but he didn't. He held his ground. He was going to show that daft old man that he didn't need him anymore. 

Standing his ground, he watched with defiant eyes as the TARDIS materialized.

The door opened, and out rushed the Doctor, nearly running into Kasteron.

“It… It worked,” he said breathlessly. It had worked, and maybe he could still make amends. He reached his hand out to touch the younger Time Lord’s arm, but Kasteron quickly pulled away.

“Don’t try to pretend like I don’t know what you did,” he said. “When I was young, I idolized you based upon the grand stories I heard of your travels. Either those were tall tales, or you changed; and if it’s the latter, than that’s quite a shame, because you were a great man. But great men do not destroy worlds, especially their own. Now, you are no great man. You might have been at one time, you might even never have been one. The man you have become is not the man I knew as a child. A child only sees the good things, the fantasy, the triumphs; never the failures to do what is right. I am no longer a child.”

“Kasteron, I know what I did. I didn’t want to do it-”

“Does it really matter now whether or not you wanted to do it? It still happened, and now there isn’t really any going back, is there? Or are there yet more things that you’ve forgotten to mention?”

The Doctor looked down out of shame. “The war is time-locked.”

“I figured as much. The High Council wouldn’t want a war as big as you’ve described to escape. Of course, in doing that, you trap everybody inside with it. So, did you side with them in the end, or was the final destruction all your idea?”

The Doctor winced. His words hurt, _a lot._ He was right, though. It was entirely the Doctor’s fault, and this was the first time in a long time that he had really had to face his guilt. “In the last days of the war, I was the only one left with any way to really stop it. No one was winning. Gallifrey was burning, and if I didn’t end it there, it was going to take the Universe with it. No one could have wanted to make that choice. And now? Now I am reminded of it every waking hour; I’m reminded that I was the one who ended it all, because I really thought there was no other choice. Maybe there was, but if so I didn’t know about it.”

He turned to Kasteron. “But you, you’re here! You’re alive! I had thought for so long that I was the last one left, forever doomed to be lonely in the universe.”

“Oh, boo hoo. Mr. Lonely. Did you ever even think to look for anyone else? Did you ever even think that there were those like me, who escaped before it was time locked?”

“No, I… I didn’t.”

“That’s just it! You seem to think that just because you’re the only one that it means you can do whatever you want. Just because we’re the last doesn’t make us gods, Doctor. There’re still limits, and there always will be. I see now what it is that’s changed you. You’ve got too much power. Maybe it’s time to back off a bit and let someone else give it a go.”

He turned and began to walk away, but the Doctor didn’t want to let him. “Please, Kasteron, Ican help you!”

“Oh?” he said, turning back to face him. “Can you really? Can you bring everyone back? Can you undo the past that you’ve created? No, you can’t. Now, if you’ll _allow_ me, I am off to make my own legend.”

But the Doctor wasn’t going to give up on him. “And you should. If that’s really what you want to do, and you’re convinced that you’re ready for it, then that’s what you should do. Just hear me out and give me a chance to try to make it up to you, please.”

Kasteron stared back at him. This was it. He could stay with the man who caused so much damage, or could he could strike out all on his own, starting from the bottom and working his way up. But, if he stayed with the Doctor, it would give him a head start. He could learn the ways of the renegade Time Lord, and use that knowledge to create his own story. Maybe… maybe it might just be worth it.

“Are you willing to make a deal?”

“A-a deal?! Yes, absolutely! ” The Doctor immediately brightened up. He was desperate to make this work.

“You show me your ways, how to be a proper time traveler, and then you let me go. I stay with you, you teach me what you think I should know, and I am free to come and go as I please.”

“Of course! I’ll teach you anything!” Finally, he would have someone to share his knowledge with, someone to carry on his legacy, and someone who he could help to create their own legacy. Like an apprentice, but not just any apprentice. He was a Time Lord, after all.

Kasteron breathed a heavy sigh and held out his hand. The Doctor stared at the hand.

“You shake it.” Clearly, Kasteron wasn’t the only one who needs to learn something.

“Oh, yes, of course! Stupid, stupid Doctor!” He turned red, quickly and excitedly shaking his now apprentice’s hand. Then the Doctor stepped back to the door of the TARDIS, holding the door and gesturing with a long arm to the inside. “You first.”

With a resolving smile, Kasteron stepped inside, but not without a friendly punch on the arm of the elder Gallifreyan.

“Oi! What’s that for?!” The Doctor said, confused and slightly offended.

“Don’t think I’m not still mad. I always will be. I’m just… Giving you a chance,” he smiled, echoing back the Doctor’s words.

The Doctor smiled back, closing the doors of the old blue box and striding over to the console.

“Just one thing, Kasteron, I think it might be best to keep that name as the one you use everywhere.”

“What? Why?” Kasteron was taken aback. Why wouldn’t he keep his real name, now that he was free again?

“Names have power. Names contain within them some of the most ancient power that there is. To someone who knows how to use them, names can be dangerous, even deadly. That’s why I don’t use my true name. Well, it’s one of the reasons, at least.”

“Fine. So I suppose that leaves ‘Sean’?”

“As long as you’re up for it. This is all up to you.”

He smiled. “Alright, Sean it is. So, Geronimo?”

“Geronimo!”


End file.
